The biggest change that Star Trek: Discovery made to the Trek canon is the addition of Lieutenant Michael Burnham, the lead character of the show who’s actually the adoptive sister of Spock. Though a human, she was taken in by the Vulcan ambassador Sarek, most known as the pops of the Enterprise’s science officer. Though it firmly tied Michael into the established lore, it did create one tiny hiccup: why the heck had Spock never mentioned her before?
Though its visuals are perhaps more inspired by the Kelvin timeline movies, Discovery is firmly set in the original canon of the Trek shows and movies as it takes place 10 years before the events of The Original Series kicks off. Season 1 left fans to worry about these discrepancies, but the upcoming sophomore run seems to be keen to hunker down and sort out its place in the continuity.
Star Sonequa Martin-Green told the press at New York Comic Con recently that season 2 would answer the question of why Spock has never once name-dropped his sister in any of his previous on-screen adventures. She also promised that every single canonical wrinkle in Discovery will be addressed at some point in the series’ run.
“Oh gosh, yeah. And we mentioned that too, you know, there’s a long game with Star Trek: Discovery. Because it is hyper-serialized, and because it is a novel told in chapters, there is a through-line, and there are conceptual weavings that take time to unravel – that might have been a mixed metaphor, but we’re just going to go with it – but I really encourage everyone to trust that every single question that we raise in Star Trek: Discovery that may seem like it’s not canon-compliant, every one of those questions gets answered. Every one.”
The opportunity to explore why Spock never talks about his sibling in season 2 is obvious: Ethan Peck’s joining the cast as the famed Vulcan. We got our first look at the third actor to play Spock in the recent NYCC trailer as well, which revealed that Peck’s version would sport a beard – and no, he’s not from the Mirror universe!
Other Trek canon connections to look forward to this year include the arrival of Anson Mount’s Captain Pike and Rebecca Romijn’s Number One, both from TOS‘ pilot “The Cage.” Showrunner Alex Kurtzman has also teased that’s just the beginning of the classic characters making their way to Star Trek: Discovery this season, so be sure to keep your eyes open for more.